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theatre · Friday 25 September 2026 · 8:00pm 
The Love Hungry Farmer
At Ardhowen Theatre · Dublin Road, Enniskillen, Co. Fermanagh
At Ardhowen Theatre · Dublin Road, Enniskillen, Co. Fermanagh
John B. Keane’s comic creation John Bosco McLane comes to Enniskillen on Friday, 25 September 2026, in a touring production of The Love Hungry Farmer performed by Seamus O’Rourke. Keane, the Listowel playwright and pub landlord whose work shaped a generation of Irish rural comedy, wrote John Bosco as a bachelor farmer whose amorous ambitions never quite land, no matter how hard the local matchmaker tries. The show runs an hour and fifty minutes at the Ardhowen and carries an 18 plus guidance for adult themes and innuendo, so it is a night out for grown-ups rather than a family show.
The play follows John Bosco McLane’s long, cartoonish and occasionally pitiful pursuit of a wife, drawing on Keane’s Letters series of writing and his ear for the rhythms of rural Irish speech. Even the local matchmaker, Dicky Mick Dicky O’Connor, cannot get John Bosco over the line, and the humour sits somewhere between slapstick and genuine sympathy for a man who has never quite worked out how to be loved. Seamus O’Rourke, a well known performer of Keane’s work on the Irish touring circuit, carries the show largely solo, leaning on storytelling as much as scene work to bring the character to life. Expect a broad, warm, unapologetically adult comedy rather than a polished literary revival, in keeping with the material’s roots in Keane’s own pub-honed sense of humour. Tickets are non-refundable once booked.
The Ardhowen sits on the Dublin Road on the edge of Enniskillen, beside Lough Erne, with parking on site. Translink buses from Belfast and Bus Éireann coaches from the Republic both serve Enniskillen town centre, a short taxi or walk from the theatre.
Enniskillen’s island setting and castle museums are close by, and a September evening is a fine time to combine the show with a look around the town beforehand. There is more to see in Enniskillen and across Co. Fermanagh.
Heading to Ardhowen Theatre in Enniskillen? Fermanagh has plenty more to see. Read the Enniskillen area guide, find what else is on, and explore the towns and villages nearby.
In town for Ardhowen Theatre? These Dublin tours book out in summer.